Rare find

Avondale Estate map shows how pioneers planned to use land

Lawson Hull
Public relations intern
Avondale College of Higher Education
Cooranbong, New South Wales, Australia

The chance discovery of a map from 1895 shows how Seventh-day Adventist pioneers planned to use the land on which Avondale is now built.

The boundaries and subdivisions of the Avondale Estate appear on a linen map curator Rose-lee Power found while sorting through files in the archives of the church in the South Pacific’s head office. The map is now kept in the Adventist Heritage Centre, located on Avondale College of Higher Education’s Lake Macquarie campus.

“Finding an original is like finding gold,” says Rose-lee, who has previously seen only a photocopy of the map. “It’s fascinating to see gazetted streets that don’t exist now. Wharfs and trees along Dora Creek, which you can clearly see on the map, aren’t there anymore. How times have changed.”

According to Dr Milton Hook in his book, Avondale: Experiment on the Dora, church pioneers saw potential in the then Strickland and Inglewood Estates in Cooranbong as grounds for a school—they wanted a rural property in an isolated area so students would not be exposed to “worldly” activities. However, the poor quality of the soil discouraged them. When the members of the inspection team were about to leave the town, they met a local road contractor, William O’Neill, who told them about the then Brettville Estate. It had been offered at auction earlier but fell short of the reserve price of 1000 pounds.

After a protracted debate, primarily over a government report about the quality of the soil and an initial plan for a crowded community on small allotments surrounding the school buildings, the church voted to proceed with the sale.

“The fact that the estate remains essentially rural and is still meeting the needs of the college shows the wisdom of our pioneers,” says Rose-lee.